


open waters

by justlikeswitchblades



Category: Kuroko no Basuke | Kuroko's Basketball
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, F/F, Mermaids
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-26
Updated: 2017-05-26
Packaged: 2018-11-05 00:57:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,260
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11002614
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/justlikeswitchblades/pseuds/justlikeswitchblades
Summary: Masako is known for taking in strays and outcasts, but they're always strangers when they first arrive.





	open waters

**Author's Note:**

> garciraki for mermay/a vague underwater yanki AU (though is it really mermay if you imply one is a siren...lol) thanks richer for the prompt!

Masako doesn't trust the shallows. Nor does she trust the deep.

Diving down isn't easy. Your body feels heavy; your head feels like it's about to split. Surfacing is nothing to made fun of, either. The sky is so bright that it makes your eyes and skin sting with the light and the heat, and even though Masako can breathe the air, taking in too much at one time can make her feel dizzy.

She doesn't mind it when the sky goes dark, dotting itself with pinpricks of light. But her favorite place is halfway down, where she can make out the harmless shadows from the more menacing ones. She feels safe, in the open ocean, where the light doesn't sting, but still illuminates all around her. 

Part of it is how she was raised, she has to suppose. Her parents were reclusive, living in the shadows of shipwrecks; the school wanted to leave them behind, she remembers eavesdropping as a child. There were kinder folk who advocated to keep her from being abandoned, and her parents would eventually skulk along on the school’s treks, bellies to the sand until they found a suitable new home. 

One day, the school geared up for the next migration; when they arrived, Masako realized she was alone. 

Not that she was all too upset by it. She was close enough to maturity, and truly, her parents were two of the greedier members among them. Searching for treasure never had much of an appeal to her; she preferred to go out to hunt, and learn, to live a life with purpose.

The school was made up of good people. But there was a way of life there, even amongst nomads—find a mate, namely a male one, and increase the population—that just didn't appeal to her. 

So she took off on her own. And some of the other girls came with her. 

Masako remembers once being told she was quiet and capable. Somewhere along the line, capable became calculating; it had to. Territory is still a loose definition when it comes to her breed, but when you pick up strays and young girls, you have to determine when you stop letting yourself get pushed around. Between the sharks and the sailors and everything else that sees her girls as meat, Masako isn't about to lie down; _she_ determines who gets to enter her sea.

“Hey, Boss. There's a body in the water out east.”

Masako doesn't lift her gaze; she tends to a scrape on one of the children, who had been playing a little too rough by the coral.

“Is it one of ours?”

“Nah, doesn't look like it.”

Masako looks up. “Is it human?”

Hana swishes her tail. “No legs. What should I tell the scouts?”

“Nothing,” Masako pauses for a moment, smiling and sending the girl back to her mother. She turns back to Hana. “Go get Umi and Reiko. We'll swim out together.”

Hana nods, darting off in the direction she came from. Masako places a hand on the grip of her sword, tucked into a belt of woven seaweed that sits at her hip.

***

The woman is floating face down in the water, long golden hair cascading out in a halo around her. Her tail is a sunset of a gradient, the tan of her skin blending into pink and orange and red scales, fins translucent and thin. The girls flip her onto her back; some water gurgles out of her throat, but she otherwise doesn't react. Masako watches her gills flutter at her neck, the rise and fall of her chest. Her palms are rough, nails sharp, a serrated row of teeth visible through her parted lips. There's a mess of netting scarred into her side; scabbed over to keep away predators. She presses a palm to the woman's chest; her heart is thudding slowly, but nowhere near the pace of death. 

“Man,” Umi frowns, holding a blonde lock up to the subtly bronzed ends of her own. “Wish mine got that kinda color.”

“Umi, be serious!” Hana pouts before looking back to Masako. “What are we gonna do, Boss? Bring her back down?”

“I don't know about that,” Reiko backs away a little, holding the small bump of her stomach. “Look at those teeth! What if she's a carnivore?”

“Rei-chan,” Umi sighs, exasperated but still fond. “We're carnivores.”

“I think you meant cannibal.”

“She looks dangerous,” Masako bites her lip in thought, folding her arms in front of her chest. “But we've never seen her around here before. If she's lost and we help her find her way, we could gain a powerful ally.”

“Alright,” Umi shrugs, swimming underneath the woman, head popping up on the other side of the woman’s waist as she heaves her onto her shoulder. “We're going under.”

With a thrust of her tail, Umi’s head disappears underneath the surface of the water, and the woman's body follows. But isn't even a few seconds later until there's a mess of thrashing and white foam, and Umi breaks the surface, sputtering and breaking away. 

“Fuck me,” She swims back to Reiko, who inserts herself between Umi and the stranger. “Never heard of a mermaid that couldn't breathe underwater.”

“And I've never been so rudely awakened from a nap,” comes the reply, the woman lifting herself up. “But I'd be happy to pay it back.”

“We mean no harm,” Masako straightens, fingers curling around her sword. “We only wish to help you.”

“Wow, you've got an interesting voice. I'm not sure if you're pretty or ugly from the sound of it.”

“Hey!” Hana furrows her brow, swimming in front of Masako. “No one talks to our Boss like that!”

“Hana,” Masako’s voice softens, placing a hand on Hana’s shoulder. “It's okay.”

The woman brushes her hair away from her face. Her eyes are cloudy, close to an opaque white.

“Oh, are you all women?” She turns her head, scanning the group but looking at no one in particular, and smiles. “You should've told me sooner!”

***

Her name is Alex—Alexandra, but she shortens it when the syllables stumble on Masako’s tongue. Her voice lilts with a melodious accent, and she has a warm personality, though there's an edge of suspicion beneath it. Not that Masako blames her—neither of them know who the other is. She _can_ breathe underwater, but Masako can tell she doesn't like it. Clutching loosely at Masako as her guide, her body goes rigid as they swim further down, shivering in the cooler water. The other girls split off, albeit warily, when Masako motions them to. 

“So,” She asks, slipping out of Alex’s grasp and coming to a stop in front of a vibrant reef. “Where are you from?”

Alex pauses, looking Masako’s way at the sound of her voice.

“Well,” She smiles, a little sad as she laughs to herself. “I'm not so sure where I am right now; I can't say I’d be able to point you in the right direction.”

“I was just trying to get a decent meal,” Alex frowns, touching the scars on her side. “Some sailors didn't take too kindly to that, and they managed to get a hold of me. They held me captive—for a long time—until they thought I was a goner. Then they threw me overboard.”

“You...eat humans?”

“Oh, just the men,” Alex flashes a grin. “But the woman are fun to play with, too.”

“And your eyes…what did they _do_ to you?”

“My eyesight had started going long before I was captured. But they got worse a lot faster out there—I dried up without the ocean, you know?”

“I can heal myself a lot faster in the water, but it takes a lot out of me,” Alex explains, a sort of boredom in her voice as she braids a small section of her hair. “And that's how I ended up here.”

Masako holds her chin. 

“I don't think either of us can do anything about your eyes,” She muses aloud, swimming over and placing her hands on Alex’s scars. “But I can help with this.”

Alex takes a breath. She doesn't jerk back from Masako’s touch.

“Do you want to find your way home?”

“Want is one thing,” Alex laughs, sarcastic and clipped. “Ability is another.” Masako opens her mouth, then frowns, her hand dropping away from Alex’s side. 

“My apologies for my word choice. But even so, I— _we_ have a reputation for taking in strays. You are welcome to make home among us.”

“I can't say I have any other options. But I might prefer it more if I had some place to surface.”

“There's a sandbar less than a kilometer away; I can take you there.” Masako takes Alex’s hand, gently tugging until she starts following along. Alex sings softly all the way there.

“The sound bounces off of things,” She explains when Masako opens her mouth, a mischievous smile on her lips. “But when it comes to offered body heat down here, I won't say no.”

***

Masako leaves Alex alone for a few days, then; there's no need to hover, and there's little time to, with all the other little duties that require her attention. She can at least infer that Alex is doing okay—she hears a strain of the same melody Alex sang early one morning, a large shadow passing in a slow trance in the open water overhead. The melody petered off, and within the hour, the ship had retreated, back from where it came. She can't deny she's curious, but she'd rather spare herself from anything gruesome, and the gossip amongst the girls isn't known to be the most reliable source of information.

She finds time to surface later in the evening, dark sky sparkling with infinite white lights. It's easier for her to see in the dark like this, and she finds Alex tucked into the shadows of a few rocks that jut up into the air, breaking the water’s surface. Alex stirs when Masako lays her hands on her side; the scars are still there, but shrunken and more smooth.

“Sorry. I didn't mean to wake you.”

“I was wondering when I'd see you again,” Alex’s teeth flash white, grinning at her own mistake. “Well. You know.”

“From what I hear, you've been able to keep yourself fed.”

“I don't know _what_ you've heard, but I don't like to make a mess,” Alex huffs, crossing her arms. “I can eat fish if I need to, but sometimes you just want a meal that'll really fill you up. Either way, I think I've done a good job of keeping everything clean.”

“I try not to pay attention to the details—unless you end up bringing trouble,” Masako raises an eyebrow before realizing it doesn't have the same effect, but there's still something proud in Alex’s face, in how she sets her jaw.

“Even if they understood what I spoke, I wouldn't betray anyone who helped me.”

“Thank you,” Masako tells her, quietly, and Alex's face softens a little as well.

“Say, a lot of these girls are paired off when they come up and say hello; which one’s yours?”

“They're all mine,” Masako answers, her voice going flat. “They're family.” 

Alex sets a hand atop Masako’s, her fingers curling around her wrist. “That's not what I mean.”

“I haven't found anyone who is appealing,” Even though Alex's stare is a little off, Masako finds herself glancing away. “Nor do I have the time.”

“Hey, Masako. What do you look like?”

Masako closes her eyes, doing her best to ignore the warmth that rises to her cheeks. “Didn't you say you couldn't tell whether I was ugly or pretty?”

“I couldn't,” Alex tilts her head, smiling in agreement. “But I'm curious.”

Masako thinks back to the distorted reflections she saw of herself in rusted gold as a child, of the times she surfaces during the day and bothers to look back down. 

“Dark hair,” She says after a moment, exhaling a breath. “Pale skin. Black tail, with purple and blue.”

Alex carefully pries Masako’s hand from her side; Masako doesn't resist. Her hands slide up Masako’s arms, fingertips pouring over her skin and the curve of her shoulders, careful not to scratch with her nails. Her fingers comb through Masako’s hair, moving carefully back down over her features, cupping her cheeks and dragging her thumb over her lips. She presses her palms into Masako’s breasts, squeezing, letting out a delighted laugh when Masako squeaks and thumps Alex's tail with her own out of reflex. Masako opens her eyes, closes them when Alex leans in, her lips soft and warm. Alex’s fingers continue moving on down her stomach, to the start of rougher scales, slowing a little when she reaches the seaweed belt at Masako’s hips. 

“Careful,” Masako warns as Alex gropes along the belt, helping her draw the sword out of its sheath. She keeps the blade in her palms, holding her breath as Alex’s fingers glide over the surface; Alex draws back with a sudden hiss, clutching her hand to her chest, and Masako quickly covers her sword, swimming to her. She takes Alex's hand between hers, exhaling softly at the drop of blood beading at her fingertip. Masako lifts Alex's hand to her lips, kissing her knuckles gentle and slow. 

“No one is appealing, huh,” Alex repeats, quiet, a small smirk on her lips. Masako’s lips twitch against her skin. 

“Maybe I spoke too soon.”


End file.
